SPIRITUAL PRACTICES, SELF-HELP AND GURUSHAKTI When one proceeds to the finer and finer levels of the ego, conflicts automatically resolve themselves. By trying to resolve a conflict, you are creating a more significant conflict. The very idea of resolving a conflict is the seed of another discord. Because two things are required to complete a conflict to create this friction, and the clash itself is a conflict. Firstly, two objects oppose each other, and the two objects coming in touch create friction. Friction is another conflict. The friction produces around itself or attracts round itself all the dust of the two pieces of wood that are rubbed together, engenders more and more conflicts. The only way out is to refine the ego through spiritual practices, through self-help, and then if those two things are done, Gurushakti is there, automatically on its own. It comes running without asking. Open the window; the fresh air just enters; you do not need to invite it. That is how conflicts are erased. THE UNIVERSE STRIVES FOR A BALANCE ALL THE TIME This means that to erase conflicts, it is not necessary to eradicate the ego because the ego is beyond the level of annihilation. And in the refinement of the ego, which is leading us to its finer levels, the grossness that was there is never destroyed, but it is discarded so that that grossness goes out and meets up with a similar kind of grossness. That is how the ego self purifies itself. Purification is the discarding of the grossness that is there. It is not a question of annihilation. Every wrong thought that a person thinks is never destroyed. It floats away in the atmosphere, and where there is similar negativity, it would go and attach itself to that. When a good thought emanates in a man’s mind, it is never destroyed. But when you come to a far finer thought, the previous good thought, forever existing in the universe, attaches itself to its similar kind. So, look at the help man receives when he brings his ego-self or mind-self to a far purer subtler level. For every pure thought you think, do know that the energy of ten other pure thoughts is being attracted to you and strengthens the purity you have brought upon yourself. This whole universe is so composed that everything helps everything. Even in the human body, if you cut your finger, you will find that various white corpuscles from the body will rush to the wound to help the injury, an automatic process. Your mind has not called upon the white corpuscles to come and heal, but without your knowing, they rush to the troubled spot and help. This is happening similarly in everything in the universe. The universe strives for balance all the time. RESOLVING PERSONAL CONFLICTS If you look superficially at the sea, you will find the waves moving from over to over, reaching the shore. That is not happening, you know. The waves are just there all the time; they are not moving. They are just going up and down, up and down, up and down, giving the illusion that that portion of water is moving from there to there. Similarly, that is what happens in this universe. There is motion all the time. The motion is there, but the motion is self-contained there on the spot, now and here. So, when it comes to resolving personal conflicts, one has to make an effort to take the ego or the mind to a subtler level, and the problem gets fixed. The best and the easiest way to take ourselves to the subtler level of the mind, to the refined section of the ego, is through our spiritual practices. That is the easiest way, and if a conscious effort backs that up, the process becomes smoother and more manageable. That is the royal road to getting rid of the conflict. FROM SILENCE WE COME, AND TO SILENCE WE REACH AGAIN It is the action of man that brings his consciousness to the troubled areas of conflict, and if a man tries consciously to get rid of his ego, he is strengthening the ego and deluding himself. What is deceiving? The ego is deluding because, like the mind, the ego has various sections. Divinity combined with relativity is nothing but a continuum from the grosser to the subtler, and so is the ego. The whole process of man or the universe is to reach the subtlest level of being, and when one reaches the most modest of relativity, he does not need to seek being. He is being. In other words, you will find that this journey has been no journey. From silence, we come, and to silence, we reach again. Where have you gone? Nowhere. From whence cometh thou my friend, and where goest thou? Nowhere. It is only the dross, the dirt accumulated over the centuries; as that atom progressed and swirled through the universe, it picked up all the dust because it combined itself with all the elements in the universe. And having free will, at that time, he could have discarded the parts that clouded his vision. But no, he did not. Some of them were very pleasurable. So, all the pleasure found has to be repaid in some way, in conflict. THE SECRET IS TO FIND AN EQUILIBRIUM BETWEEN PAIN AND PLEASURE For every pain you have, remember that you will have equal pleasure in some way or another because pain cannot exist alone and must be accompanied by contentment. The rise of the wave will have its trough, it will always be there, and it is only the refined ego or the realisation of the deeper levels of the ego that will make us not feel all the pleasures and all the pains so intensely. So there, too, we come to an equilibrium. The secret is to find an equilibrium between pain and pleasure; when that equilibrium is found,
The River of Life: Living Joyfully in the Flow of Life
WHATEVER HAPPENED HAD TO HAPPEN We do not need to bother ourselves about past experiences and past karmas. The greatest disease man suffers today is the sense of guilt. That is the cause of most mental and physical ailments, for the mind translates into its physical equivalent, the purpose of guilt. What are you guilty about? Why create greater and greater conflicts in your mind because of what has happened in the past or might happen in the future? The past is gone. Some seeds have been sown, and who knows if they will grow in the future. There might be a drought. Create the drought by just working and not by thinking of what the future is going to bring or what the past has formulated for the future. Why feel guilty about whatever has been done in the past? How do you know you have done it? Are you sure that you, the real you, have performed a specific action? No. You have not performed any action. You are not the doer. You are just an instrument. The Great Doer knows why your little ego had to go through these processes; therefore, we stop condemning ourselves, and when we stop blaming ourselves, we stop condemning others. When we stop condemning ourselves, we do not feel guilty. The past is the past, and that was regulated within this process of evolution. Whatever you did, whatever happened, had to happen. You did not make it happen. You were instrumental in the happening, but a stronger will made it happen, a will far more significant than what you think is your little egoistic will. IF LIFE IS LIVED, WE JUST DO At that state, there is no karma. When Milarepa, the great Tibetan yogi, was a young man, he said, “I did black deeds and then when I got more knowledge, I did white deeds. But now I have risen above both. I do no deeds.” That area of no deeds is the most significant action area, the greatest inaction in action because the whole idea of doing is gone. “I do” has disappeared. It is just done. That is how you clean off the slate of those experiences and samskaras. You do not do. It is just done. If life is lived, we just do. I am speaking to you. Do you think I am doing anything? I am doing nothing, just sitting here enjoying myself, that is all. You might say, “Oh, Gururaj is lecturing. He is working.” No, I am not. I am having fun. I shut off the mind, let the inner Self flow, and look at the beauty of the flow. Look at the music of the bubbling brook that passes through this voice, the symphony, the melody. Listen carefully. It is not only the words. For who is uttering the words? Not I. I am just an instrument. All I have learned is how to tune this instrument to the greater I, to the real I, and let Him do the bloody work. Why must I work? And because He flows through me, I still enjoy it. That is my little fun. My little fun in this vast ecstasy of life. NEVER BE BOTHERED AND NEVER FEEL GUILTY That is how we get rid of all these samskaras. So never be bothered and never feel guilty. You have harmed no one in your life, and no one has ever hurt you. I am putting forward a lot of new thoughts to you. Man’s mind is running in grooves, which must be altered, for, in ages to come, that will be the salvation and consolation for man. In Indian villages where there are no tarred roads, you have these dirt tracks, and the ox carts go through them all the time, creating these grooves. The ox pulls the cart, and the driver can sleep because the wheels run in the tracks. We have to put a stone in the groove so the driver wakes up when the wheel hits it and jolts it. We have to wake up because we are sleeping in certain fallacious beliefs. Sinner, sinner, sinner, sinner, guilty, guilty, guilty, guilty, what for! Is that the hope for man, or is that condemnation of man? The more guilty you feel, the more miserable you will feel. If He, omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent, is the doer, then who else could be the doer? He does, and because of the various mixtures and admixtures of the material you are made of, which includes the mind and body, specific patterns have been formed that make you experience life in a certain way. But if you experience life, not as the doer, if you have that idea, then whatever experiences you go through will not add to your karma. It will not, and that is how the ego is clarified. That is how this most significant disease in the world, guilt, can be eliminated. Do not feel guilty; that is the only way you will find the truth. Because guilt is like a whirlpool, you are always caught up in it. “Oh, God. I have done this.” All the organized religions include all the theologies: Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, the lot, the works came in, and what did they do? They tried to hold us by fear when they could not capture us with love. Eternal damnation. It is not valid, and there can never be eternal damnation. If there were eternal damnation, then the Eternal God would also be damned, for there is only one eternity. YOU ARE THE FLOWING RIVER Live happily. Be of good cheer. Forget those samskaras. Forget those experiences, although they might be regulating your life today. Accept what is today and act accordingly. Put in changes wherever you can to make you flow more smoothly. Get rid of some of the boulders in this river of life, so the water flows more smoothly, and even if there are boulders in the river
The Absolute Beyond Consciousness: The Absolute just “Is”
EVEN THE AVATAR HAS EGO When it comes to a great teacher, an Avatar, an Incarnation who has come to teach the path for people to reach this level, he has taken upon himself an individuality. Suppose you can picture yourself an ice cream cone from the broad end where he exists. In that case, he brings himself to the narrow end of the cone to assume or to take this individuality, and individuality necessarily has an ego. Ego is a perfect word but so misunderstood. The ego that people usually talk about is the grosser ego and not the refined ego. The refined ego is on the level of Superconsciousness where its constituent is Sattvic force, pure force, the force of Light. That still does not alter the fact that it is ego. It is still ego, but at its subtlest level of the Superconscious Mind, it is in direct contact with the Absolute. In other words, it is the clearest reflector of the Absolute and that Light is reflected in the world. BECAUSE OF THE NEED OF THE UNIVERSE, THE AVATAR TAKES FORM The Avatar or the Incarnation can merge away into Unity by will, into the Absolute, where nothing remains of him. Still, he consciously assumes form because of the need for the universe and the world. That is why the great Sages have come in the forms of Christ and Krishna and Buddha etc., and that is why they have come. Just imagine coming from that universal vastness into the limited small body. There is the paradox, where a man can remain in a limited small body and yet be entirely universal, where he is here, there and everywhere, expressing himself in a very tangible form. That which is intangible becomes tangible. That which is Absolute becomes relative. That is the beauty of it. THE WHOLE UNIVERSE IS FOREVER TRYING TO PRESERVE A BALANCE Do you know that there could never be more than seven self-realised people in this world? If there were more than seven self-realised people, this whole universe would go into imbalance. Too much good is also an imbalance, not in man himself but the universal self. So, the entire universe as the individual self is forever trying to preserve a balance, and that balance, in straightforward terms, is called tranquillity. In these tranquil waters, the waves and the ripples have subsided. And when the waves, the ripples subside, conflict ceases because the momentum of another wave creates one wave. They are there all the time. If you look superficially at the sea, you will find the waves moving from over there to over there, reaching the shore. That is not happening, you know. The waves are just there all the time; they are not moving. They are just going up and down, up and down, up and down, giving the illusion that that portion of water is moving from here to there. WHEN A SELF-REALISED PERSON DIES, HE MERGES AWAY INTO THE ABSOLUTE When a self-realised man dies, he merges away into the Absolute. To merge into the Absolute, there has to be no trace of the individual “I”, never mind how refined it is. In the heat of the Absolute – this is using the word poetically, of course – in the power and the heat of the Absolute, the finest trace of the ego disintegrates, and it disintegrates and joins itself up with the various other elements at its level. That is it. Because when the mergence takes place, He becomes the universe. THE ABSOLUTE JUST “IS” When we talk of the total refinement of the ego, that ego is so extended that it is as vast as the universe. When total mergence with the Absolute takes place, then to the Absolute, there has been no ego. The universe is a dream, but for relativity, the universe is real. When we reach the Absolute, nothing else exists but the Absolute. So, it depends on what angle we look at it. This can only be fully appreciated if one has reached the Absolute. Until then, we are still swimming around in the sea of relativity. Some people have reached finer levels or finer limits of it, but it is not the completeness of it. By refining the ego to that extent where one encompasses the entire universe, you have only reached the level of the totality of the universe. Some people call it the Personal God, some call it Christ Consciousness, and some call it Krishna Consciousness. Yet the impersonal God is beyond all consciousness because consciousness, too, is limiting. Consciousness, too, is within the realms of relativity, while the Absolute just is. Because even the purest consciousness requires to be conscious of itself, and immediately consciousness becomes conscious of itself, ripples start at the most refined level of the ego. THE ABSOLUTE IS EVEN BEYOND THE LEVEL OF CONSCIOUSNESS The Absolute is beyond the finest level of the refined ego and even beyond the level of consciousness where it does not need to be conscious of consciousness. It is just an “Isness.” The electricity current that burns in these lights is not conscious of itself as electricity. It is only the usage of it that tells us that these light burns because of electricity. It is a realm beyond human conception, and one that has not realised that can only know about it. And that is what the Universities do; they tell you about a thing, but not what it is because that “Isness” has to be experienced and shared by itself, without the experience. That is what is meant by “Isness.” You just are. I am that I am, no qualifications, no adjectives, and that is what it is. … Gururaj Ananda Yogi: Satsang UK 1978 – 35
Stretching the Ego: Illuminating Individuality Through Our Spiritual Practices
STRETCHING THE EGO It is a misconception that one must get rid of one’s ego to fulfil one’s potential. That is not possible. If man remains an embodied being, there will be ego. In the grosser person, the ego would be expressed in a gross value, and in a more developed person, the ego would be expressed in a refined value. As practical householders with family commitments, we want to use that very same ego that constitutes us, that constitutes the entire human personality; we want to use that ego not only in a refined manner, not only in a sublimated manner but to use that ego until it is stretched to a specific limitation where a great clarity is observed in the ego. We could use the analogy of a balloon. As the balloon is stretched, the rubber that makes the balloon becomes fine. When it becomes fine, greater light penetrates it, which means that the ego is not sublimated. Sublimating an ego might mean pushing the ego aside or giving the ego a different value. We do not want to do that. We want the ego to have its original value and not transform it into different values. We do not want to take a particular item and convert it into a different substance altogether. The rubber of the balloon must remain the rubber of the balloon. But by expanding the rubber that constitutes the balloon, by stretching the rubber, it will become fine, and when it becomes finer and finer, it becomes more transparent. When we stretch the ego, it becomes more transparent, and more of the Light of the Spirit can shine through. The ego is to be preserved and not destroyed. When the ego is stretched through our meditational practices, through the understandings and realisations we receive, and as the light more and more filters through it, the ego assumes a different form. It is not destroyed. It is not sublimated, but it is brought to its greatest potential. The same ego is brought to its greatest potential in its refinement. Man could never exist as an embodied being if he did not have an ego. Ego is that which gives man a sense of individuality. If man wants to live in this body, he must have a sense of individuality but an individuality at its finest level, where that individuality becomes refined and transparent. WHEN THE TOTALITY OF LIGHT SHINES THROUGH, MAN FINDS FULFILMENT Ego can be very gross, can be very opaque, where light cannot shine through, and the same ego can be so refined and stretched that the fullness of the light comes through. It is only when man discards the mind and the body entirely then only the light will remain. But for practical purposes as householders, as living, breathing human beings, this is an impossibility. If any man tells you that “I am egoless,” that is not the truth, for even the highest realised man will still have a trace of ego in a very refined manner and so refined that the glass is so clear that the entire Light of Divinity can shine through, but the transparent glass is there. The whole process will be to clean up the glass and make it transparent. That is the process, and by making the glass translucent, the glass assumes an invisible form because the powerful light is shining through. You will notice this in many things where if you put a strong beam of light behind a piece of glass, you do not see the glass. You must have heard of many people walking through a glass door because they did not see the glass. I have been into one shop once, and they had one of these doors without frames, just glass, so they had to put a sticker on it so that from a distance, you could see that “Look, there is glass there, and I have got to open it.” That happens in the refinement. To repeat, it is not a question of annihilation or sublimation. Annihilation means destroying that glass, and when you destroy the glass, you are destroying your entire personality. Man cannot exist without being an individual being, without being a personal being. But with the light shining so powerfully through, through the clear glass, what could be observed is the light only and not the glass. That does not mean that there is no glass. Man finds fulfilment in life when the totality of light shines through, despite there being a glass. This means the Universal Self shines through the individual self because the individual self has been cleansed and refined. It is only when the body and mind are discarded at the time of death of a realised man, like my guru, that it would all merge away. At that time, the intense heat of that light disintegrates the glass, disintegrates the ego, and it goes back into its original vibrations. THE EGO FACTOR IS NECESSARY TO LIVE RESPONSIBLY The householder has to be conscious of himself. If he is not aware of himself, he will not be able to relate to his environment. He will not be able to tell to his wife, children, his beloved, and his friends because their individuality must exist. If individuality does not exist in everyone, then the whole purpose of life is lost. Then you do not need to serve humanity because you are not an individual anymore. It is only the unit that tries to get together or become one with all the units around him and form a whole. To be able to live responsibly, the ego factor in man, the personality of man is necessary. If the entire ego were destroyed, your whole personality would be destroyed, your mind would be destroyed, and your thinking ability would be destroyed. You would become mindless and body-less, and only the Spirit would exist, which is the Universal Spirit, and you become one with the
Our Divine Path: The Real Journey Within
OUR DIVINE PATH You are on the divine path. You do not need to find the divine path; for any path you take is only to the Divine. Where else can you go? There is nowhere else to go but to Divinity, so whatever path you choose is a path to Divinity. If a path is chosen with twists and turns, it will take longer. It will take so many, many, many lifetimes, and in these lifetimes the lessons we have to learn could be not so pleasant. What is the direct path where lessons to be learned could become pleasant, and they could be compacted instead of being stretched out? Where does Divinity reside? That is the question. We usually say Divinity is everywhere, omnipresent, so in whichever direction you look, you will find Divinity, but the easiest direction to look is to look within, for you would know you better than anyone else and that makes the path much easier, quicker, by looking within is the process. OMNISCIENT, OMNIPRESENT & OMNIPOTENT We say that Divinity is omniscient, omnipresent, and omnipotent. Being omnipresent, it is everywhere. Divinity is in the chair, in the table, in the flowers, in you – everywhere, but if one starts searching for that Divinity in all various objects in our perception, it will take millions and billions of years to uncover that. The outward search is not always successful unless you are a bhakti yogi where there is total devotion to a particular object in total devotion and complete surrender! By projecting your mind outward to the object of devotion, one only mirrors oneself. Again you are brought to yourself, so, the path of Divinity lies within. THE PATH LEADS ON WITHIN All the time, we have been teaching how do we tread this path within. Meditation and spiritual practices are the path that leads one within. In these meditational processes, what obstacles do we come upon? What are the hurdles? The peaks and the valleys, they all have to be gone through. What do we do apart from just meditation – and, what is meditation? When you stop meditating, then you are in meditation. This sounds paradoxical, so it requires an explanation. I am feeling lazy today, so I am not going to meditate. That does not mean you have reached anywhere, but when one reaches the totality of meditation where it would not even be necessary for you to sit down to meditate. Life itself becomes like the river ever flowing on, then that very flow of life becomes a meditation. That comes at a later stage where every action, every breath one takes, is a meditation, but at the beginning, where we start on the path, techniques are necessary to reach the goal, and then you even discard the techniques. THE PATH OF YOGA Yoga is a path, and by yoga, I do not mean hatha yoga. Yoga as a whole is only the start on the path of meditation. Patanjali talks of yama, niyama, asana, pranayama, pratyahara, dhyana, dharana and samadhi. You reach Samadhi or total meditation after going through all these various limbs, but these limbs are not steps, they can be acted upon simultaneously. Yama and niyama means restraints and observances. That is very easy which anybody could work out for himself in the process. Right living, right thinking, putting in some effort to better ourselves, restraining ourselves from things which we should not do to preserve purity or things that we should do to preserve purity, those are observances and restraints. Then we have the process of asanas – that is where hatha yoga comes in – to keep the body healthy, supple, pliable so that you could sit and meditate without feeling tired, where the inner organs are massaged. Pranayama regulates oneself. It regulates the rhythm in the body, for prana is not the breath that you take in – most of you that have read “Raja Yoga” (Vivekananda) will know this – but it is a vital force contained within the breath. It is contained in the food that we eat. That vital force is contained in everything, and pranayama is a method of capturing that vital force within ourselves to gain that needed energy. When one sits down in meditation, that vital energy captured within us helps the meditation. It helps dharana, which is remembrance. It helps dhyana, which is a form of meditation as well. All these are preparations for total meditation. Reaching total meditation, one has reached the goal. The process is nothing else but preparation, and this is what yoga teaches. You develop concentration – and we do that without concentrating through our Tratak practices (a visual form of meditation) – then remembrance, contemplation. Contemplation should be an unbroken contemplation. You try out one experiment and look at your watch to see if you can be focused for three seconds. You try that out, and you will see how difficult it is. It sounds so easy that all your attention can be focused for three seconds. No! Within those three seconds, your mind will wander so much, so it has to be brought to that state where the mind does not wander, and it becomes one-pointed. Try it out for three seconds and see. If you can fully concentrate on a particular object just for three seconds, then you know you have reached somewhere in concentration. By having the proper concentration, your thoughts become powerful. They become like laser beams. Then when you sit down to meditate on the mantra with a concentrated mind which does not require effort. Tratak teaches you that concentration without even concentrating and it brings all the mental forces together. MEDITATION In our meditations, all the practices that are prescribed are interlinked, and this is the process – they are all interlinked. You develop concentration and one-pointedness, which in turn helps your mantra meditation. You become so at one with your mantra that you automatically
No Medium Needed: Finding Oneness with God
YOU ARE BORN STRONG There are no psychic powers in this world that could have a bad influence on you, and this is a great misunderstanding that must be corrected. For no one’s psychic abilities, no one’s thoughts can ever affect you if you are strengthened within yourself. You will not feel the cold outside if you put on your overcoat, and that overcoat is the spiritual practice that gives you the strength so that no one could ever have any influence over you, and you are not to be influenced by anyone except by yourself. Use the analytical process of the mind, use the energies of the core of your personality and be strong. Why should you be weak when you are born strong? You have every ability within yourself, and yet you subject yourself to outer influences when it is unnecessary. To repeat over and over and over again, realise that Divinity is within yourself. Because this message is so hard to understand, do not use your mind to understand me. Use your Heart to feel me; that feeling is not an emotion. It is not emotion because emotion is a mixture of thought and feeling. But when it comes to pure feeling for which I have no other word to describe it, it becomes a knowingness, to know that which is Divine.So, forget the psychics; that is rubbish. THERE IS NO MEDIUM BETWEEN YOU AND GOD If you feel very good with a person, continue that feeling of very good but ask yourself one question, what is the motivation behind that feeling of very goodness? If the motivation is pure, there is nothing wrong. If the reason has certain connotations which are not pure, then discard the person. These mediums are a whole load of rubbish. Who can be the medium between you and God? There is no medium. There is no medium at all. You might have great teachers coming to teach you the truths of Life, but that is all; remember that. That is all. How do these mediums operate? It is so simple; I could teach it to you all in two- or three months’ time. Just to spend some time with me and I could teach you all these tricks. I could teach you the tricks of psychometry, clairvoyance, mind reading; you name it. When the mediums say they are getting messages from another source, then know that that source is too busy to contact you. That medium has found the little ability, which is tiny, to go to the deeper recesses of the mind, and at that time, that person might have been possessed with excellent knowledge or have learned and poured it through, thinking it is another being like Seth or Beth or – GO TO GOD You see how we get deluded by all this rubbish in the world. The medium has just developed the ability to go to the deeper recesses of the mind, reaching another period of existence within themselves and pouring out what they had learnt there. I would never advise anyone to go to a medium or a psychic; they could do you more harm than good. Go to God. Because God does not require someone to give you messages through some little evolving soul, existing somewhere in some other dimension and who is not fully developed or else he will not or cannot make any contact, for if you are still in the process of development, how can you make contact. It is a logical, physiological, biological, and psychological impossibility. Do not go to mediums, and do not waste your money. Instead, give it to your church, some orphanage, or something good that could help people. THE GAP CAN ONLY BE FILLED BY GOD AND HIS GRACE The other trick a medium would use is mind reading, which I could teach you in a couple of weeks. These things are so simple, and they are of no importance whatsoever in a person’s Life. How will it help you go to a fortune teller, a psychic or a mind reader? The mind reader picks up your thinking of Auntie Mary and tells you about Auntie Mary to make you feel happy. And after you finish bucks. You see the racket I am trying to destroy in this world, rackets in the name of psychics, noise in the name of religions, racket in the name of cults. People are so gullible because of a lack within themselves. They get taken in by anything. They feel something is lacking, and they think something is missing. They feel a gap, and they want to fill the void. That is why they go around to the psychics and mediums and bullshitters and cultists and all these damn money-making false gurus around the world. But let us fill the gap right, and God and his Grace can only fill that gap. That is what I am trying to say. YOU NEED A TEACHER, THAT IS ALL You go to a psychic, Madam Gypsy; what does she do? Firstly, she has to be a wise psychologist. She looks at you, she sums you up, and the first thing she will say is, “Oh, you got to cross my palm”, which means putting money in the hand. Then she starts telling you of yourself. We could, with any person of any bit of perception, could convey anything of any other. You ask anyone here, and I will read your whole Life for you without even looking at your hand. So, these guys develop this little ability and use it to make money for themselves, and it has become a racket, and to repeat to you, these rackets must be destroyed—all these cults, all these money-making gurus, all these religions that are not religions. And by doing that, we will find the truth within ourselves. That is what we want to do; we want to see the truth within ourselves, by ourselves, with
The Strength of Humility: Unveiling the Light Within
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HUMILITY REQUIRES STRENGTH In the Bible, it says that “the meek shall inherit the earth.” The meek shall inherit the earth, not only the earth but the heavens. Meekness is not cowardice. Meekness comes from strength; a better word for meekness is humility, and you have to be strong to be humble. If you are weak, you could never be humble. Humility requires strength. Strength is always in you, not to be discovered but to be uncovered because it is veiled. Like an electric bulb, you know you wrap a lot of cloth around it, and the Light does not come through. The process that people on the spiritual path go through is unwrapping the veils so that the Light can shine in its full brightness, which brings strength, and that is why we teach meditation and spiritual practices to unveil the veils. From where do the veils come? Divinity is a neutral energy that favours no one, and neither does it favour another. All those veils that block off the Light within you are created by yourself and no one else. These veils are composed of ignorance or nescience, where you are not aware of your true Self, that you are Divine, and it is only in the awareness of your true Self, that you are intrinsically Divine, that you will find the strength. KNOCK, AND THE DOORS SHALL BE OPENED People go through life in all kinds of misery. There is no misery in this world except that you create for yourself. There is no misery; you make it. The Creator has not created misery for you; you have created it. Why should one child be born in happy, prosperous, healthy circumstances and another born in poverty, illness, and suffering? Look, that Guy up there, which I know so well, and I live with Him twenty-four hours of the day, I know He does not create misery. It is a neutral force given to you to use whichever way you want. Use it negatively; then you have the negativity. Use it positively, and you will have positivity. You do not plant Dahlias and expect Roses to grow. This goes further back than the time that you were born. You are a total of all the lifetimes, if you do believe in that, from the very first primal atom or the amoebic stage up to now, you are the sum totality of it all because of the experiences that you have gone through, and that is conditioning your present lives at the moment. Why am I so happy and joyful all the time? And why do I see X, Y and Z outside the window full of misery? He has brought suffering upon himself. He is standing in the damn rain while I sit here so comfortably. Who says he must stand in the rain? Walk in, for the Kingdom of Heaven is within; those doors are never closed; they are open. That is why Spiritual Masters are there to lead you to the door, and as the old Biblical injunction says, “Knock, and it shall be opened,” but we are too lazy to lift our hands to knock. It is not even a physical act. You do not need to knock with the knuckles, you just need to think, and the doors are opened there for you. The closest thing to you is Divinity, yet we are so blind that we do not see it, we do not hear it, nor feel it, and it is there all the time. DIVINITY IS CLOSER TO YOU THAN YOUR VERY BREATH Divinity is closer to you than your very breath, and you become meek and humble once that is realised. And when you become meek and lowly, you know the value of love because a haughty person will never admit that love. They are all too much in their ego self: “I am Mr So and So, and I am this, I am that. “You are nothing. Your ego self is nothing, it is created by your thoughts only, and you know how thoughts work. Today you will think one thing, and tomorrow you will feel the opposite thing, and the next day something more opposite. Your ego self, the “Me and the Mine,” is the cause of all the trouble, but what about changing “Mine and Me” to “Thee and Thine.” REACHING THE SUPERCONSCIOUS LEVEL, YOU DO NOT COME BACK EMPTY-HANDED Can anyone truthfully say that this is my body? Can anyone truthfully say this is my brain? Nothing belongs to you, not even your mind or your body. The only thing you are encapsulated in are the thought forms you have created, and those thought forms in the Sanskrit word are called samskaras or impressions that have been deeply planted into the mind, and that rule governs your life. It regulates every action you do because the mind is patterned, and you do not go beyond the patternings. You just revolve around the patternings you have created, which is like a maze. You go this way, and you get caught, then you turn the other way, and you get caught, then you turn the other way and get caught, and you do not know the way out. You have created the maze. That is why Spiritual Masters come along to show you the path out of the maze you have made yourself. Finding humility, mildness, and gentleness is dependent upon ourselves. To find the humility, mildness, and gentleness of which you are born is to find that which is within yourself, and it can only be found through meditation and spiritual practices. When the conscious mind is brought to a calmer state, you go to the deeper layers of the subconscious mind in which all these impressions are captured and encapsulated. But then you still go further to the Superconscious level of the mind, where there is real peace, joy, tranquillity, meekness, mildness, and gentleness. Reaching there,
Scriptures and the Spiritual Path: Unlocking the True Purpose of Scripture
Belief, Ego, Evolution, Faith, God, Guru, Love, Path, Religion, Scriptures, Separation, Spirit, Spiritual Path, Yoga
THE PURPOSE OF THE SCRIPTURES The purpose of all Scripture is to follow the spiritual path. Because the spiritual path can never be divorced or separated from the teachings of ancient seers, they have cognised certain truths, which have been put forward for us to practice. If a person is theologically minded, he must understand all Scripture aspects thoroughly. When it comes to the Scriptures, one must use discrimination according to one’s understanding. Certain things in certain Scriptures might not go with your knowledge, and if it does not go with your understanding, you do not need to follow them blindly. That does not mean that the Scriptures are wrong. Perhaps your understanding is limited. When the understanding expands, a greater appreciation of the Scriptures takes hold of us. Many Scriptures have been misinterpreted, which applies to every religion worldwide. We can take a Sanskrit example of a word called “Jov.” “Yo” means barley, and it also means a goat. In the ritual portions of the scriptural injunctions of those Scriptures, it is said that “Yov must be sacrificed at the sacred altar.” This has been so misinterpreted that they started killing goats instead of giving barley as oblations. So, Scriptures from time immemorial have been subjected to misinterpretation. THE SPIRITUAL PATH IS THE BASIS OF SCRIPTURES To apply Scriptures to the spiritual path is a thing which is quite different. For the Scriptures to be correctly understood and applied to the spiritual path, one has to learn the Scriptures, and when one does not understand the Scriptures by oneself, we go to someone who understands the essence. Yet that which the person you go to explains to you or the interpretation of the Scriptures must not be taken on blind faith. Therefore, you will find many seekers searching as I have done. I went from guru to guru to guru until I found a guru who could give me the explanation, which was at par, at level with my stage of evolution. As we said, the spiritual path is so connected with scriptural injunctions. Let us take the Ten Commandments, which form part and parcel of the Scriptures and show you how to live a good life with its various injunctions. We have spoken on Raj Yoga which showed us the principles of Yama and Niyama and how to live a good and proper religious life. You could call it a scriptural life because the Scriptures and religion are not two things apart. So, we take the scriptural injunctions as a basis to progress on the spiritual path because we have to take this as a basis for the spiritual path. After all, the spiritual path is the basis of the Scriptures. ALL SPIRITUAL PATHS LEAD TO THE SPIRIT WITHIN Over time, many things have been added to these various Scriptures in various religions. If you take a piece of iron and leave it out in the rain, sun and snow for a long while, that piece of iron can get rusty, and people tend to take the rust for the iron. With our intellect and the powers of discrimination or with the advice and the teachings of those who know, we go beyond the level of the rust that has accumulated and come face to face with the genuine article, the iron. When we come face to face and appreciate the essence behind the rust, then Scriptures and the spiritual path become one. The whole idea is to understand our religion correctly, what our religion has meant and what the religion has taught. That is to be understood. It is not wrong for a person to follow Hinduism or Buddhism, or Christianity. Those are all paths. They all lead to the same goal and are all spiritual paths leading to the Spirit that dwells within. WE HAVE TO RISE ABOVE THE SCRIPTURES We do not make any distinctions between the spiritual path and scriptural injunctions. The validity of the Scriptures is in the fact that it has endured thousands and thousands of years. If it were essentially false, then it would not take. Like a great piece of literature – Shakespeare lived three hundred years ago, and yet we read his works today, and for the next three hundred years, his works will still be studied. At the same time, some small author not of much worth might have published a book at that very time when Shakespeare lived. He is gone, forgotten, and the book is not even there anymore. So, the purpose of Scripture is to point to our truth and show us reality in its varied forms. It shows us the truth from various aspects. The height of the spiritual path is reached only when we can view all the aspects of the Scriptures as a whole, and to do this, we have to rise above the Scriptures. If we stand at the bottom of the mountain, our view would be minimal, but if we stand on top of the hill, we have a vast panoramic view. This applies to the Scriptures. WE HAVE TO RISE BEYOND THE BOUNDARIES OF DOGMAS You have Scriptures, which could be very dogmatic. To understand what the Spirit is all about, we must rise beyond dogmatism’s boundaries. To be in any form of dogmatic faith or belief is nothing wrong, and it might be what is required by us for that moment in our spiritual path. But the spiritual path and the study of all dogmas and dogmatic creeds only find fulfilment when we transcend the boundaries of dogma. All the problems in the world that have taken place are because of dogmatism, where religions war against each other and say, “My way is right.” The other says, “My way is right”, and the third says, “My way is right.” This causes conflicts because dogmas always produce boundaries. And when we live within a limit, it would be like the story of the frog of the well. The
The Essence of Dharma: Discovering the Depths of Duty
Conscious Mind, Dharma, Divine, Divinity, Effort, Ego, Evolution, Force, Free Will, God, Grace, Happiness, Impressions, Joy, Karma, Law of opposites, Light, Love, Meditation, Mind, Oneness, Relative World, Samskaras, Scriptures, Self, Self-Realization, Spirit, Spiritual Force, Spiritual Practices, Subconscious, Superconscious, The Absolute, The Three Gunas
WHAT IS DHARMA? It is so surprising that Dharma and Karma rhyme so well, and yet Dharma and Karma are just but the obverse and reverse side of the same coin. It is a misconception to believe that Karma is wrong; you have good and bad Karma. Good Karma means actions performed that are conducive to nature and are in the flow with nature, while bad Karma would be the forces created by acts that conflict with nature’s details. Dharma means the performance of duty, duty towards one’s parents, one’s wife, one’s children, husband, friend, and society. That is the interpretation of dharma. But there are far greater meanings in dharma. It is not only a performance of duty that one does with effort. For the beginner’s some effort might be required, but one has to reach the stage of dharma whereby all actions performed, where all Karma performed become spontaneous. This very spontaneity that is developed in man shows his level of evolution and some progress in his life. You would have many mythological stories, for example, where Rama, in the Ramayana, because of his father’s promise and duty to his father, was banished for fourteen years into the jungles and underwent so many different experiences. This could be because of the promise, but the deeper meaning is that because of specific karmic values of Rama, he had to undergo these difficulties in the forests. This is a cleansing process to dharma. So, you might start on the dharmic path and end up cleansing the bad Karma within you. DHARMA LIES WITHIN KARMA Bad Karma means all the impressions of all kinds of experiences that are stored up in the mind through ages and ages, which are active experiences, or which could even be inactive experiences, meaning such things as emotions and other psychological factors. Anything that leaves an impression in the mind or the subconscious strata of the mind can be equated as Karma, and when we refer to Karma as impressions, the counterpart of Karma, we call samskaras. To repeat, Karma and dharma are so interlinked, and they are not in opposition to each other because within your Karma lies dharma. By performing good action, you are performing a dharmic action in the flow of nature. Here we do not differentiate, but all activities performed in life can be brought to a very good or refined level so that one does not only act from the storehouse of the impressions in one’s mind but from a level which goes beyond those impressions. THERE IS A DIRECT LINE TO THE SUPERCONSCIOUS MIND After the conscious mind, we have the subconscious mind, and after that, we go to a level of the Super-conscious Mind. Forces of nature govern these three so-called sections of the mind, and in Sanskrit terminology, they are called Tamas, Rajas, and Sattva. Tamas is the force of inertia or darkness; Rajas could be called the activating force, and Sattva is the force of Light. Here at the finest point of relativity, on the verge of the Absolute, we have the Superconscious Mind. People do think that seeing that I have performed so many bad Karmas in my lifetime, I will have to suffer them all. This is not necessary, although there is truth in that “whatever you sow, you will reap.” That is a great truth. But this truth applies only to the subconscious mind. When one reaches the Superconscious Mind, one can overcome all those impressions. Here is how it works. Apart from the grosser nervous system connected to the conscious mind, there is a subtle nervous system which is the hotline or direct line from the conscious mind to the Superconscious Mind. If you can activate that subtle nervous system and find the direct link to the Superconscious level, then you can draw the forces of Light from there so that they can permeate your conscious level. WE CAN BYPASS ALL SAMSKARAS WITH OUR SPIRITUAL PRACTICES Throughout all the ages, you have accumulated so many karmas, good and bad. That is one reason why all theologies have created all these heavens and hells. If you live a good life, you will go to a region where there is all happiness, which is called Heaven, and if you do bad actions, you will go to an area called Hell or suffering. That is why theologies, in their way, try to portray the result of that which is good and that which is bad. But the principle is that you do not need to go to Heaven or Hell; you go beyond that to a Karma-free region. To reach that region, we will have to go back to the main point again that this very fine network of this nervous system can lead you directly from the conscious to the Superconscious, cutting right through all the samskaras or impressions stored in the sub-conscious mind. Through meditation and spiritual practices, one does. However, at first, it might not be so apparent to you; one does reach the Superconscious level and from there draw the Light and banish the darkness of impressions, the Tamas which resides in the subconscious mind. Therefore, in practical daily living, we must remember that one does not need to feel guilty about any actions that man has performed because what is past is past. There is no future, and there is only now. With spiritual practices, we reach an area called “nowhere”, and that “nowhere” if you take note of the spelling is “now here.” That does not mean that we do not make any effort. We can bypass all the samskaras with our spiritual practices, which would have taken millions of years to clear up. If the floor is filthy, you use a broom; it will require so much energy and time, but if you have a powerful cleaner, an electric vacuum cleaner, how quickly would the floor be cleaned. So, we use the vacuum cleaner for meditation and spiritual
The Journey to Illumination: Acceptance, Devotion, Love, and Surrender
OUR BURDENS ARE NINE-TENTHS IMAGINARY Everyone wants to become so important in life, and all that importance is imaginary. Why do they want to be important? Because then they can express that ego that they have brought with them. Instead of deflating the ego, they want to inflate it. How many people are hurt in the process of inflating the ego? When others are injured, it must rebound back on you because you are responsible. It is nice to be necessary, but more important, to be nice. These are such simple home truths. If we are nice to people, we do not need to pretend. We only need to know that there is Divinity in everything, and automatically, we become nice. You must add the “n” to the “ice” and how warm you will glow. We carry these burdens; nine-tenths are imaginary. If you study fear, for example, you will find that nine to ten percent of your fears are imaginary. You fear things that might never happen, and you try repeating those fears to yourself repeatedly. You are going to make them happen. Things might have a logical order: two and two make for two, and two make eight. We can work in a rational manner, which is fine. However, rationales do not work logically. By accepting ourselves as responsible for developing the power of discrimination, we eliminate the burden we carry, and that burden is nine-tenths imaginary. What would be the worst that could happen if it was not nine-tenths? What is the worst? You will only die, and there is no death. It is another subject we can talk about. There is no death. What have you come with, and what will you take with you? Like that, it goes unnecessary burdens. Let me tell you this story. A very tall lady was six foot three, and she had a boyfriend who was five foot three, perhaps five foot two and a half. They used to go out in the evenings, and she lived a mile from the bus terminal. So, they used to get off at the bus terminal, and he used to walk her home the mile. One night, he tells her, “My love, allow me to kiss you.” He is so short that he constantly needs a stool. Here, they passed an abandoned blacksmith’s shop. So, he got onto the anvil, and he kissed his girl. Nothing wrong with that. One of the finest things invented, if you know how to kiss. Two souls become one, where the prana in two bodies intermingle to such a level of refinement that the bodies are lost, and only the prana remains. That is kissing. That is a different subject. Never mind. So, this chap gets on top of the anvil and kisses the girl, and after that, they start walking again. They were nearly home, and he said, “Honey, can I kiss you again,” with such pleading eyes. She says, “No once a night is enough.” Then he says, “Oh, what is the use of carrying this anvil with me?” Yes, we all carry these anvils around, but those imaginary burdens and burdens also have other aspects. One of the most significant aspects is expectation. This chap was expecting to kiss his girl again. Therefore, he carried that heavy anvil with him. Expectation is the father of disappointment, and disappointment is the mother of suffering. What a marriage. RESPONSIBILITY PLAYS A BIG PART IN SELF-ACCEPTANCE Expectation is the father of disappointment, and disappointment is the mother of suffering. Because one expects so much from life, that one comes to disappointments. There would be no disappointment if there were no expectations in the first place. It is better to live life from day to day. That does not mean that you do not have any ambitions or any plans in life. It does not mean that, but it means undue expectations. I know of a young man who bought a lottery ticket two or three weeks before the lottery was to be drawn, and every day, his mind was on that lottery ticket. He could not concentrate on his work; he was irritable at home, expecting, “Ah, here is something going to come for me”, but it never came, and he felt so discouraged. He invested a pound in buying this lottery ticket, and when he did not get fifty thousand for it, he was so disappointed. He cried. His wife had to phone me. She said, “My husband is in a terrible state. What must I do with him?” I said, “Get him on to the bloody phone.” Undue expectations. I expect to be loved by someone. What right have I got to hope that? I expect you to love me. What right have I got to expect that? Why not live my life so your love for me will automatically and spontaneously materialise? Being responsible is so important; it plays a significant part in self-acceptance. And to be oneself, whether one is a prince or a pauper, is a joy in itself. Do you know there is such great joy in being a pauper? I remember running away from home once. I came to Bombay with nowhere to stay, slept on the beach for three nights, and then thought I had to find some food, so I went to ask for work in a little restaurant. I said, “Look, I do not want any pay; just give me a plate of food; I am prepared to work.” It was quite a good bargain for an Indian businessman. Meanwhile, it was such a joy to wash those dishes. I thought, “Oh Lord, you are giving me the opportunity, the privilege of washing someone else’s dishes.” How beautiful. Perhaps it is one way of serving humanity. I knew that because I was not going to get paid for it. The job lasted three days. The health authorities came along and would not allow me to sleep